The promise
by valsore
Summary: Sometimes the promises we make to the ones we love are the hardest ones to keep


**This story is kind of a prequel of "Stay with me". Both stories can be read separately.**

At first he had no idea where he was. There was nothing. Nothing but a dark haze and silence. He felt the overwhelming urge to drift back into the quiet darkness and rest, just rest. But then there was something, somebody, that simply wouldn't let him. He didn´t know exactly what it was, but it was there, insistent and annoying…

So he made an effort and tried to come back, even if it was just to ask to be left alone.

Unfortunately, the first thing that came back to him was the pain, like a whirlwind, increasingly stronger every second. First there was a shooting sting in the back of his head, then an excruciating and almost unbearable pain shooting up his left leg. There was no pain in the darkness he'd surfaced from. So he tried to dive back into it. But there it was, again, that something that wouldn't let him escape the pain.

After the pain came the noises, faint and distant at first, like a murmur, then louder, and closer. He just heard a confusion of sounds, all around him. Then he started to make them out: the blasts of guns firing, screams, horses neighing. And, at last, the voice, so close to him, practically on his face, calling his name again and again, dragging him out of the haze. He felt a pair of hands grabbing him by the shoulders, shaking him over and over. He knew that voice, he was sure. And the touch of those hands…

"Kid!" the voice was shouting. "Kid, wake up, dammit! Wake up!"

And suddenly it all rushed back to him. In a split second he remembered everything. He remembered seeing her on her horse, shouting orders, unaware of the soldier aiming his rifle right at her. The anguishing moment when he knew there was no time to warn her. Doing the only thing possible, ride rushing toward her and knock her off her horse, putting himself between her and the shooter. Then there'd been the sudden, sharp, blast of pain in his leg as they both fell to the ground.

_Lou!_

His eyes snapped open.

She was kneeling beside him, shouting at him to wake up, right in his face. She looked shaken and was a bit scratched up, but she didn´t seem to be truly hurt. He sucked in a deep breath of relief. She was fine. She was fine.

"Lou?" he managed to mumble.

She sighed and cupped his cheek in her hand.

"Thank goodness you´re awake. Thank goodness," she said softly.

He looked at her worried face. She was pale and completely covered in dust, from her short hair to her boots. But even in that Confederate uniform she managed to somehow look pretty.

"Have I told you you´re the most beautiful lieutenant I´ve ever seen?"

She smiled. "Well I certainly _hope_ I am!"

Lou was so relieved to see Kid was finally awake that she forgot for a second the urgency of their situation. But an explosion dangerously close to them reminded her. They were in the middle of the battlefield, soldiers shooting and fighting all around them. Their horses had fled when they fell. Worst of all, Kid was in bad shape. She had been trying to wake him up for the longest minutes of her life and she was actually beginning to wonder if she could carry him, when he had finally come to his senses. They needed to get out of there. They needed to get out of there _now_.

"Kid, can you get up?" she asked as she put one hand behind his head to help him.

Kid pushed himself up on his elbows and lifted his head, which pounded with every heartbeat. Lou looked at her hand behind Kid´s head and saw that it was covered with blood. He must have hit his head hard when he fell. She helped him sit up. That was when he cried out and grabbed her arm.

"What? What is it?" she said with concern.

"My leg," he grunted.

She quickly checked. There was blood on his left leg, above the knee, and a small rip in his pants. She tore the fabric open, feeling Kid shudder as she did so, and immediately her heart sank. She had glanced at the wound before but had been so worried trying to wake Kid up that she hadn't taken a closer look, until now. And it looked pretty bad. It was enormous, gaping open, and bleeding profusely. She could see the broken bone sticking out through the torn muscle. Little pieces of grit and shattered bone lay scattered all over the wound. And she noticed that the leg was now laying at a slightly odd angle.

_Shit! Shit!_

Lou knew bullet wounds were often fatal. She had to get help as soon as possible. He needed a doctor or he would die. She took a deep breath before looking back at her husband.

_Keep calm, just keep calm._

Kid was staring at his leg with a horrified face.

"Oh my God…" he whispered.

"It ain´t that bad, sweetie." Lou knew that sounded stupid, but she didn´t know what else to say. She tore a piece of cloth from her sleeve and started to wrap it tightly around the leg, above the wound. Her hands were shaking badly. Kid gasped and held his breath. "But we need to stop the bleeding right now."

_Alright, alright, that would do for the moment…_

She looked back up at Kid's face. He was breathing heavily and sweating from the pain.

"Do you think you can get up?" she asked.

He nodded and reached for her. She stood, put her arms beneath his and, as he held her shoulders, pulled up. She didn´t let go of him until he has standing, even when she heard him scream in agony. She had never heard him scream like that.

They stood holding each other. Kid was panting and shaking, standing on one leg and leaning all his weight on Lou. She had to use all her strength not to fell to the ground again. He was too heavy for her.

Kid was amazed at the amount of pain he was feeling. It was unbearable. He felt a terrible nausea and a strong dizziness.

"Lou", he whispered, as calmly as he could, panting against her hair. "Lou, I think I´m gonna faint…"

She pulled back and glared at him, a harsh look on her face.

"No, you ain´t! You can't!" she cried sternly. "Don´t you dare faint on me, Kid! I can´t carry you! Please breathe, just breathe, okay? You´re gonna be fine."

He closed his eyes and tried to breathe slowly to ease the pain. He felt her hands stroking his back.

"C´mon baby, we can do this…" she whispered. They needed to _move_. Standing there in the middle of the field they were nothing but an easy target. She could hear the bullets whistling over their heads and all around them. She let him catch his breath for a moment, then said, "Kid, I´m sorry but I need you to walk, alright?"

She helped him put one arm over her shoulders, held her gun at the ready in one hand and clasped him tightly to her side with her other. She looked up at him. His skin was turning gray and his hair and face were covered in sweat. He looked back down at her and somehow managed a smile.

"I´m alright," he rasped in an attempt to comfort her. "Don´t worry, Lou".

She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek and smiled back at him. _So typical of Kid, trying to be strong for her…_

"Ready?" she asked.

He nodded and ventured a step. He could barely support his left leg, and the pain every time he moved was extraordinary. He felt very weak and queasy, probably from the loss of blood and the hit on his head. So he had to lean all his weight on Lou, who was so much smaller than him. They moved in a crouch to avoid getting shot, which made it even more difficult. He wiped the sweat from his eyes with the back of his sleeve and tried to look ahead. Between the smoke and the explosions he couldn't even tell where their lines were. How much farther would they have to walk like this to get to safety?

He focused all his energy on moving forward, faintly aware of Lou shooting her revolver two or three times. He couldn´t understand how come he hadn´t fainted already. One step. Another step. Until he couldn´t go on any longer. He stopped. Lou quickly looked up at him, her face clouded by fear, dreading the worse.

He was about to say something when another explosion, this one far closer to them than the earlier ones, knocked both to the ground in a cloud of grit and dust.

Lou immediately leapt back on her knees. "Kid?"

They were both coughing and drenched in sweat. She quickly grabbed him by his shirt to try to pull him up again. Gathering all his remaining strength, he managed somehow to sit up, but he knew that was as far as he was getting. He couldn't go any further.

They were never going to get out of there at this rate. Not if they kept moving like this. He was only holding her back. It _was _true, he just couldn´t go on. The pain in his leg was intolerable, and he was so weak he felt he couldn't move anymore. His head was killing him. An astonishing variety of black and bright colored sparkles danced and whirled around in front of his eyes, and he had a constant whining sound in his ears. He could feel he started to lose his balance

But Kid was a strong man, with a strong will, and he definitely didn't want to die. If he ever had a good reason to live, it was now. Now he had Lou by his side, and the promise of a bright future together laid ahead of them. So he knew that if he tried really hard, maybe he could get up and keep moving. But that would undoubtedly get Lou killed trying to save him.

He was the only reason his wife was in this situation to begin with. If only he hadn´t been so stubborn about coming to fight in this hellish war, which he knew by now had been a terrible mistake; if only he had insisted more strongly that she stay home, not that it would have made any difference…

He remembered so well that fateful afternoon, more than two years ago, when he'd finally built up the courage to tell Lou he was leaving. They were still staying at Rachel´s, figuring out the next step in their lives. But they both knew they were just putting off Kid´s departure. It was just hanging there in the air, between them. When the Express finally shut down, Kid knew it was time to go.

She was out in the back yard, her arms leaning on the corral fence, looking absent mindedly at the horses wandering around. It was very hard for her, he knew, giving up her job and staying home, helping Rachel, all just so they could be together. Kid always thought he could never thank her enough for that. He knew perfectly well she could cope with it because it was temporary. They were just waiting for the Express to close, and then they were going to buy their ranch, and she would be back to doing what she really liked: working with horses. That was their plan and their dream. But now that would have to wait, too.

He approached her from behind and put his arms around her waist, hugging her tight. She smiled and turned to face him, but when she saw the look on his face her smile faded away. She could read him like an open book.

"Oh Kid..." she said, putting her hands on his chest.

He gave her an apologetic smile.

"I´m sorry, Lou," he softly said. "I tried to delay this as long as I could, but I have to go. You knew that."

She heavily sighed and turned away again, crossing her arms and pulling free of his hug.

"I know, Kid, and believe me, I´ve tried very hard to understand you, to understand that you really believe you´ll be fighting for Virginia and not for slavery."

"That's got nothing to do with this, Lou, and you know it," Kid said, turning serious and shaking his head. "Virginia is my home. What kind of man would I be if I turned my back on my home?"

Lou turned to face him again.

"This is your home now. _I'm_ your home now." She held her hand up when he was about to answer. "But, I know. I know you have to go, because of this… terrible sense of duty and honor you have." She kept talking so he didn´t have time to reply. "And I know I have to respect you, because I really love you. Just as you made such an effort and learned to respect me when you thought I was being…reckless, or putting myself in danger. And you did it because you really love me. Well, this is important to you, just like that was important to me. I know that I could easily manipulate you to make you stay," she went on without a pause, ignoring the look on his face as she said this, "make you feel guilty about leaving me so soon after our wedding or something. Believe me, I could think of something… but I won´t do it."

"Thank you Lou, that means a lot to-" Kid tried to start, but she cut him short again.

"Wait!" she said, holding her hand up once more. "I ain´t finished. I´m not gonna try to make you stay because I know, sooner or later, you would resent me for that, and I don´t want that kind of feeling between us, ever. So, it´s okay. Go, if you really feel you have to, but on one condition."

Kid frowned, knowing what she was about to say but dreading it anyway.

"What condition, Lou?" he asked slowly, in an almost inaudible voice.

She looked straight into his eyes, tilted her head slightly to one side and with a wicked smile said in a matter-of-factly way, "I´m going with you, of course."

He stood there, looking blankly at her, his mouth half open, shaking his head as if he really didn´t know what to say.

"Lou, I, I…" he finally stammered.

"Listen, Kid, you have a duty to your homeland, I get that. But you also promised me, your wife, never to ride on again without me. Remember? Well, I´m holding you to that promise," she said, pointing her finger at his chest. "You ain´t alone anymore. You have me. And if this is so important to you then you may go, but I´m going with you because there´s no way on earth I´m letting you go to that hell by yourself. You need someone to look after you and that someone is me. And as true as my name is Louise McCloud I ain´t staying here worried sick every second of the day for God knows how long, dreading every telegram or letter that arrives, wondering if you´re dead or alive, or hurt, or hungry, or whatever. I couldn´t bear that. I need to make sure you´re alright. So we´re going together and then we´ll come back together and buy our ranch. End of story!"

She looked defiantly at him, almost daring him to try talking her out of it.

"Or what, a promise to your Virginia is more important than a promise to me?"

Not giving him a chance to answer, she turned on her heals and marched into the house, leaving him there with his mouth half open and without anything to say.

Even as he came to his senses and ran after her, frantically trying to figure out how to convince her not to go, he knew this battle was lost already.

In some ways, deep inside, he was happy she came, because they were together, no matter what. He knew he wouldn't have been able to bear these past few years away from her. But now the time had come to finally draw the line. Lou was fine. She was unharmed. He would make sure she stayed that way.

"Lou," he said, grabbing one of her hands, which were still wrapped frantically in his shirt, and looked her straight in the eye.

"What?" she asked fearfully. By the look in his eyes she knew perfectly where he was heading.

"Lou, you need to get out of here…"

She shook her head, not letting go of his shirt, instead wrapping her fingers tightly around his larger ones.

"No way, Kid. I ain´t leaving you."

She motioned, as if to try to get him up, but he stopped her.

"Lou, listen!" he said harshly. "I just can´t go on anymore, and you can´t drag me all the way out of here!"

"You bet I can, Kid! Just-"

"No!" he cut her off. He knew he was going to collapse any second, and he needed her to be as far away from him as possible before that happened. Otherwise she wouldn´t leave. "Listen, please listen! I´m only gonna get you killed! All that matters to me is that you´re all right, and you know that! Now just get the hell out of here, you hear me?"

She looked at him. He meant it. The worst part was he was right. He really looked like he couldn´t go on any longer, and she could only imagine how much pain he was suffering. And they were still so far away. The plain truth was they were never going to make it, not at this pace. But Lou knew it wasn´t the pain or the weakness that was making Kid give up. He wanted to stay behind so she stood a better chance of surviving. _Stubborn, stubborn man!_

She knew telling him she wasn´t going anywhere wouldn't do a damned bit of good. Telling him that even the thought of going home without him, of spending the rest of her life without him, was unbearable. _Was there even a home, without him?_ But she really didn´t know what to do. She felt the despair starting to crawl all over her body, and she fought with all her might the tears that were building in her eyes. But she could be as stubborn as he. Truth to tell, she _was_ more stubborn than he.

She felt it as he started to let go of her hand and slide down. His eyes rolled backwards as he weakly mumbled, "Please go, Lou. Please…"

"No, Kid, stay awake!" she cried, grabbing at his shirt again with both hands, holding him and shaking him heavily.

He startled and focused his gaze again, looking at her. He opened his mouth to speak but she didn´t let him.

"Now _you_ listen to me!" she shouted right in his face. "I didn´t came all the way here, staying by your side for the last two years, just to let you die! You know perfectly well I ain´t going anywhere without you! So, if I have to drag you all the way, that´s exactly what I´m gonna do!"

"Alright, alright!" he said. "Then go get help."

She glared at him. "Yeah, right. As if anybody is coming to help us! You just want me out of here, Kid!"

He tried to say something, but she snapped at him.

"Don´t! Just don´t! Get your butt up _right now_, cowboy, or you´re gonna get us both killed! Stop wasting precious time telling me to go away!"

He smiled weakly at her and stroked her face with one hand. His beloved blue eyes filled with worry, worry for her. He knew she meant it. He could see how determined she was. He knew she was capable of staying and dying with him. But this time he wasn´t going to let her.

"Lou," he whispered. "I can´t go on. Please, please just get out of here, I´m begging you."

"Is that right, Kid McCloud?" she exclaimed. "Well, if that´s the way you want it, that´s the way you´ll have it!" And she slumped on the ground beside him, crossed her arms and legs, looked away and just stayed there.

Kid slowly shook his head, looking at her in disbelief.

"For chrissakes, Lou! What on earth do you think you´re doing?"

"Waiting for you to come to your senses. _Now_ you´re gonna get me killed, because I ain´t moving until you do." She looked at him, smiling sarcastically. "See? Now it really is _your_ fault that we´re both going to die in this hellhole."

She hated to be so hard on him, but she knew it was the only chance she had to make him see sense.

Kid just stared at her in awe. _Stubborn, stubborn woman! Damn!_

"Alright, alright," he groaned angrily, finally giving in.

Lou grinned and scrambled to her feet, put her hands below his armpits again and practically lifted him up.

He didn´t scream this time, as hard as that was, and stood, wobbling, leaning on her, trying to gain his balance.

"Do it for me, Kid," she whispered on his ear. "Please, do it for me."

"Dammit, Lou," he mumbled, closing his eyes and breathing slowly, fighting the terrible nausea that had overcome him again, focusing on staying up… and conscious. But he had to do this. He had to do this, for her. He put his arm around her shoulders, as she wrapped hers around his back. He nodded. "Let´s go."

_Take one step at a time, just one step at a time. Ignore the pain._

"The thing is," she said, grunting with the effort of keeping him upright, "I´m too young and pretty to become a widow. And it ain´t like it would be easy for me to find another husband, you know? Not after sleeping in a bunkhouse with six men for practically two whole years, and another two years in the Army."

That managed to make Kid chuckle despite it all. He kissed her hair. "I love you so much, baby."

She held him tighter. She could barely walk under his weight, and she felt her legs shaking with the effort and the exhaustion. She was drenched in sweat and her mouth felt like it was stuffed with dry cotton. They still had a long way to go.

Lou never quite understood how they managed to get behind their own lines. She practically dragged Kid most of the way, and somehow they didn't get shot, even after she ran out of ammunition, long before they arrived. But they did it. Somehow.

As soon as they reached the point beyond musket fire, they both collapsed to the ground, breathless.

"We did it, baby, we did it," Lou panted.

She immediately got up and started waving her arms and calling for help. Two stretcher bearers spotted them and rushed over. They didn´t ask anything about Kid's wounds. They just laid the stretcher on the ground, put Kid on it, lifted it up and ran back to the medics, with Lou on their heels. At the makeshift tent, they laid Kid on a blanket on the ground, beside many others wounded men, and rushed away.

Lou knelt beside him and took his hand. He looked at her.

"Lou?"

"Hmm?" she stroked his hair.

"How did we just do that?"

She smiled and shook her head. "Beats me, honey. But now we need to take care of you."

She looked around, and waved at one of the men who were helping the doctors. His clothes were stained with blood, and he was moving quickly from one patient to the other. He came their way and kneeled beside them.

"What seems to be the problem, Lieutenant?" he asked wearily.

"He has a bullet wound on the leg and he hit the back of his head very badly," Lou replied hastily.

He took a small, round pellet of something sticky out of a pouch and gave it to Kid. Then he produced a liquor bottle.

"Here, wash the pill down with this," he ordered.

Lou helped Kid lift his head.

"What is it?" she asked

"Opium and whiskey," the assistant replied in a matter-of-factly way. "We´re lucky today," he added tiredly, as Kid took a stout drink from the bottle to wash away the bitter taste of the pill, "usually we have to settle for the whiskey alone."

He first checked Kid´s head.

"This one has stopped bleeding," he commented. "Let´s hope he doesn´t have internal inflammation. Normally there's nothing we can do if that happens." His voice was absolutely emotionless.

Moving on to Kid's leg, without a word, and completely ignoring Lou´s questioning look, he cut Kid´s pants, drenched in blood, took off the bandage she had previously made, and roughly cleaned the wound, quickly putting a new bandage on it.

"That will slow the bleeding for now," he said, ignoring Kid´s clenched fists and teeth while he worked.

He stood up, waved at somebody and shouted, "Here´s another one for the field hospital!" Then he turned to Lou, "What ´bout you?"

She looked at him questioningly, and then she realized her shirt, pants and hands were covered in blood, too.

"I´m…I´m alright," she mumbled. "It ain´t my blood"

He nodded brusquely and moved on to another patient. But he looked back at Kid one last time, smiling wearily. "Look on the bright side, son. At least the war is over for you."

Lou never left Kid´s side while they took him to the only available ambulance, a rough four wheeled wagon already crowded with injured men. She knew she was supposed to rejoin the battle, since she was unharmed, but that would have been absolutely pointless. It was over for both of them. Kid was the only reason she was here, and staying by his side was the only thing she was going to do.

She made sure he was as comfortable as possible, lying on the cart floor and already dozing off from the opium and the whisky, then she climbed in beside him.

It seemed to take forever to get to the hospital, another improvised facility inside a solitary, deserted church about five miles from the battlefield. She held Kid´s hand throughout the ride, making sure he was still breathing. He was completely out by now.

When they finally arrived, her heart stopped. The hospital was in worse condition than she'd feared, worse than any she'd seen in the last two years of war. There were so many battered and dying men outside the church, lying or sitting on clumps of hay, an occasional blanket or the bare ground, just waiting their turn. Some of them were groaning or screaming, but many were eerily quiet, just waiting. As the ambulance approached, she was hit by a terrible smell of blood and putrefaction.

Then she saw it, just behind the church, a growing mountain of amputated arms and legs, more than three feet high, covered by a dark and buzzing cloud of flies.

_Oh my goodness…_ Lou took a deep breath, looked away, and tried to focus her mind on Kid. That´s when she felt his hand squeezing her own with all his strength. She looked down at him. His eyes were wide open, staring at the bloody pile of limbs.

"Lou…" he whispered, starting to breath rapidly again.

"I´m right here baby, don´t worry."

A medical officer was quickly checking the men in the ambulance as two assistants pulled them out of the wagon and put them on the ground. He approached Kid, who had managed to sit, and took a quick glance at his leg.

"How does it look?" Lou asked, kneeling beside Kid and trying unsuccessfully to conceal her anxiety.

"Friend of yours?" the doctor asked

"My brother," she answered hastily. She was so used to posing as her husband's brother that she didn´t think twice about her response.

The man just kept checking on Kid.

"What are you doing here anyway?" he asked, without looking at Lou. "You´re not supposed to be here."

She stiffed but just said, "I know, Sir. How is he?"

Kid said nothing. He just stared at the man, a terrified look on his face. It seemed he was going to throw up any second.

"Well, he´s going into surgery right away. He'll probably make it," the doctor said. Lou sighed in relief. "But, if he wants to live, that leg´s definitely coming off. We´ll be right back for you, son." Patting Kid's shoulder gently, he left.

Lou felt her throat go dry. That´s what she had feared from the moment she'd seen Kid's injury. She slowly looked down at Kid, who still remained silent. He was staring blankly ahead of him, his face completely dry of any emotion. That scared her even more.

"Kid," she said softly, trying to sound as calm as possible.

"So they´ll just chop off my leg? That´s it?" he said, with a frighteningly calm voice

Lou took a deep breath. "Honey, if that´s what it takes to save your life. That bone is badly broken, and you´re still bleeding."

He completely ignored what she said. He slowly took her hands between his own and turned to look at her, straight in the eyes. "Lou, you have to promise."

"Promise what?" she replied, shaking her head in confused question.

"Promise that you won´t let them take my leg."

"What?" she cried with astonishment. "Kid, what are you talking about?"

"You heard me," he said, still very calm. "I don´t want them to cut my leg off."

"But… but Kid," Lou stammered. "That´s probably the only way to save your life!"

"I need you to promise, Lou," he repeated, very slowly.

She shook her hands free. "No! Of course not!" she practically shouted. "I don´t want you to die, Kid!"

He grabbed her roughly by the shoulders, suddenly losing his calm completely, his eyes flashing.

"What kind of life can I give you as half a man, Lou?" he cried. "What kind of life would that be for us if I can´t work, if I can´t ride, if I can´t take care of us, of you?"

She shook him off. "I´ve never asked you to care of me!"

"I know, I know! But you can´t be tied up to a crippled for the rest of your life! I won´t do that to you! You´d be much better off without me!"

"Don´t say that Kid! You won´t be a crippled, and you know I love you, I don´t care-"

He interrupted her. "I know you don´t care, I´m sure you don´t care, but I do care." He took a deep breath and tried to calm down before going on. "Lou, you know me so well, nobody knows me like you do. And you know darn well I can´t live like that. Please."

She held his face between her hands. "Kid, that´s the drugs talking. You´re not thinking straight."

"You know I am, Lou," he replied, putting his hands over hers.

She freed herself again, stood up and looked away, folding her arms. "That´s the most selfish thing you´ve ever ask me, Kid. I just want to spend the rest of my life with you, no matter what."

"No. What would be selfish of me is to attach you to a useless, dependant husband. And I know you don´t see it that way," he hastily said before she replied. "But I do, and I love you too much to do that to you." He paused. "So please, I´m begging you, you have to promise."

She stood quiet for a moment, looking into the distance. Then she turned to him.

"What makes you think they´ll even listen to me?" she spat angrily, shaking her head.

He smiled. "Lou, take my word on this, when you really want people to listen, you make them listen."

She looked deeply at him. He was there, sitting on the floor, breathing rapidly from the pain and the effort of speaking, drenched in blood and cold sweat. His face was a deadly, ashen white. Her handsome, sweet and honorable husband. Her silly husband, always determined to do the right thing, no matter what. A husband without whom she couldn't even imagine her life.

She kneeled down again, put her hands behind his neck and look him in the eyes. "You´re asking me to practically demand they let you die. I can't lose you, Kid."

He gave her his sweetest smile, the one she couldn´t resist.

"You ain´t gonna lose me, Lou," he whispered.

She was certain of one thing, though. If they amputated his leg, she was going to lose him anyway, even if he lived. At least she was going to lose the Kid she adored, because he would be miserable, and bitter, if he felt he couldn´t take care of her. That was just the way he was, and Lou knew it.

She hugged him as tightly as she could, softly stroking his hair.

"I love you more than anything, Kid. But right now, I really, _really_, don´t like you."

"We´re gonna be just fine, Lou," he whispered sweetly on her ear, hugging her back. "We always will be."

"I know," she mumbled.

Two men approached them with a stretcher. Everybody here seemed to be covered in blood, Lou couldn´t help thinking.

"Your turn, Lieutenant," one of them said, bending to help the other man lift Kid onto the stretcher.

Kid frantically grabbed Lou´s hand as they lifted the stretcher off the ground.

"Lou, promise, you have to promise!"

She felt his hand slip out of hers as the men took him away.

"Lou!" he cried one last time, looking back at her.

She didn´t move. She just took a deep breath, and felt her heart rip apart as she said the hardest thing she ever had.

"I promise, Kid!"

But she knew he hadn´t hear her. He had passed out again.

Lou rushed after the men carrying her husband away.

Panting from her rush to catch up with them, she asked the orderlies, "What 'bout them?" She nodded toward the other men that had arrived with them in the ambulance. They were just lying on the ground, waiting.

"Doctors can´t afford to waste their time on those they can´t actually help," the man mumbled.

If the field hospital looked bad outside, on the inside it was much worse. Divided in two with a makeshift installation of drapes, one side of the church was crowded with cots, where the men recovered from surgery before being shifted to the general hospital further behind the battle lines.

On the other side, there were three tables, where the surgeons worked simultaneously, having no time to lose. Everything was covered in blood there too, from the doctors to their instruments, the floor. The smell was terrible.

Beside the table in the far corner, a surgeon and his assistant were waiting for Kid. As they approached, Lou noticed that it was the same doctor who had examined Kid before.

He tossed Lou a quick glance when she followed as the orderlies put Kid on the table.

"You again?" he said, checking Kid´s leg one last time while his assistant put a damp cloth over Kid´s mouth and nose.

"What´s that?" Lou asked.

"Chloroform," he said, without looking at her this time. "You don´t want him waking up while we cut his leg off, now, do you? We´re not barbaric. Leastwise, not when we've got the means to be civilized."

Lou swallowed hard.

"Isn´t there anything you can do about his leg?" she asked.

"Yes, there is" the surgeon said, as his assistant sharpened the butcher-type knife. "Amputate".

"I meant-"

"I know what you meant," he cut her off. "And the answer is, 'No.' Not if you want your brother to have a chance. Now please, leave and let me do my work".

"But there must be something!" Lou insisted.

"No, there isn´t!" the man answered impatiently. "Now leave or I´ll have you kicked out!"

Lou took a deep breath.

"I´m sorry, but I won´t let you cut off his leg," she said defiantly.

The surgeon looked at her in disbelief.

"What was that again?" he said.

"You can´t cut off his leg. It would kill him. He doesn´t want it, and I ain´t letting you. There has to be something else you can do for him."

The doctor was getting really mad. She saw him glancing for the stretcher bearers, probably to tell them to take her outside. But, luckily, they weren't around.

He looked back at her. Lou could see how extremely tired and fed up he seemed.

"What is going to kill him is the hemorrhage and the gangrene, young man. I really don´t get you? Don´t you want him to live?"

"Of course I do!" Lou exclaimed. "But this is about what he wants!"

The doctor shook his head and started cutting Kid´s skin with the scalpel. Lou felt her guts suddenly shrinking

"Please, I´m begging you, don´t do this!" she cried.

"I really had it with you," the doctor snapped at her. "I don´t get you! I´m trying to save your brother´s life! Doesn´t his life mean anything to you?" he asked as he kept cutting.

"His life means everything to me," she replied, the words spilling out of her mouth in haste, but each one carefully enunciated. "His life means so much to me that I came to this hellish place to fight in this stupid war just to be with him, to take care of him. The only thing that matters to me is getting him home with me, no matter what. Leg or no leg. But-" she held her hand up to silence the doctor, "_but that ain´t what he wants!"_

She must have moved the man somehow because he softened just a little. But still, he was determined.

"I´m sorry, there´s nothing else we can do. And if you really love your brother the way you say you do, you´d want the best for him."

Lou sighed. This man was not going to change his mind. She was starting to feel desperate as the doctor kept cutting Kid´s skin in the middle of the thigh. She was about to open her mouth to play her last card when she heard a voice on her right.

"What seems to be the problem here?"

Lou turned to see who the speaker was. The captain who had been operating at the next table, and who had overheard everything, was now coming towards them.

She jumped at this new chance.

"Please Sir, if there´s anything you can do …"

"Well young lady," he said casually, leaning forward to quickly examine Kid´s leg, "let´s check this fellow´s leg and see what this fuss is all about."

That finally got the surgeon's, and everybody else´s, attention. He froze with the scalpel in midair and slowly raised his eyes to the captain.

"What on earth are you saying, Captain Turner?" he exclaimed.

The Captain calmly turned to Lou, who was paralyzed and speechless herself. "Let me guess. You don't look alike at all, so… your husband?"

Lou just gave in and nodded. It didn't matter anymore anyway.

Now both the surgeon and his assistant were looking at Lou in awe. And she could sense the men from the next table watching her too.

The assistant's mouth gaped wide open.

"You're a girl?" he finally mumbled.

"Of course she's a girl. Just look at her," Captain Turner said impatiently.

"But, but, how?" he stuttered. "I mean, you´re a lieutenant .It ain't possible!"

"Well, clearly she´s doing a good job," Captain Turner said, an amused smile on his face.

"We both are, Sir," Lou replied.

"Captain, Sir," Kid´s surgeon said angrily, finally getting his voice back, "I don´t care if he-" he corrected himself, "she, I don´t care if she´s his wife, sister, grandmother, or favorite horse! I need to amputate this man´s leg now!"

The Captain, obviously the chief surgeon, was calmly inspecting Kid´s wound again, ignoring the other man's complaints.

Lou kept quiet, waiting. Captain Turner finally looked at her and stood silent for a moment, as if weighing the situation.

"Well, about your husband´s leg," he finally said, "you do realize that there is extensive damage to the muscle, and the bone is badly broken. But-" he said raising a finger at Lou, as she opened her mouth to argue with him, "maybe, just maybe, if we can control the bleeding and try to repair the bone as much as we can, he has a chance to keep his leg."

Lou beamed at him, but the other doctor immediately objected.

"What about gangrene?" he asked. "You know there´s a huge risk-"

"If there is gangrene," the Captain cut him off, "then we´ll amputate."

The other surgeon couldn´t believe what he was hearing.

"You know a second surgery is a luxury we can't afford!" he exclaimed.

Captain Turner turned to him.

"I do believe this young lady here, who made lieutenant, just earned that luxury for her husband."

The he looked at Lou again.

"What's your name?"

"McCloud," she said. "Lou McCloud."

The captain smiled.

"Captain Mark Turner at your service, Lieutenant McCloud," he said, gallantly bowing his head to her. Lou could see the other doctor rolling his eyes.

"I want you to be perfectly aware of the risk we're taking here, ma´am," he went on. "You'll have to watch him closely for gangrene, and he'll have to stay still for several weeks if we want that broken bone to heal."

She nodded vigorously. She couldn't believe what was happening. There was hope. There was hope and that was all that mattered.

"Yes, of course."

"And if he makes it, he will need crutches, and then a cane, for a longtime."

Lou just kept nodding. That didn't matter.

"And he'll have a limp, a bad limp, probably for the rest of his life."

"That's all fine," Lou said. "We can live with a limp."

The other doctor was shaking his head at them in disbelief.

"I don't believe this," he snapped. "I refuse to take part in this nonsense. I´ve wasted enough of my time here." He turned on his heels and, followed by his assistant, stomped to the next table, where another man was being prepared for surgery.

"Well, then," Captain Turner said, ignoring the other man. "Let´s get to work".

"Thank you, thank you so much, Sir," Lou said, starting to back up, out of the way.

"Where do you think you're going, Lieutenant?" he asked, raising his eyebrows at her.

She looked questioningly at him.

"You heard them. You've already waste too much of their time. They're not going to help us. So get back here. I need an assistant."

Lou walked slowly back to the table.

"Yes, of course," she mumbled.

Kid lay in a semi-coma in the hospital for almost three weeks, burning with fever, shaking and calling Lou's name or moaning unintelligibly. Captain Turner had told her Kid´s leg might have a chance, but it all depended on keeping away the gangrene. He also told her that wounds seemed to get gangrene less often when they were kept clean, so she might as well try to do that.

Lou spent her days by his side, cleaning his wound assiduously and almost obsessively, wiping his sweaty forehead with a cloth, talking to him soothingly, trying to calm him, feeding him the best she could, and tending to every one of his needs. And in the moments when she was not busy with him, she helped with the other patients in any way she could.

She didn´t dare leave Kid, even for the night. So she slept on a makeshift pallet on the floor, right beside him.

Every day she made a nurse check his leg, dreading the announcement that she'd discovered gangrene. But every time the nurse looked back, smiling at her. The gangrene never came, and after a week they told her it was improbable it would.

One morning, completely exhausted, Lou fell asleep on a chair beside Kid's bed. When she slowly opened her eyes, she was surprised to find Kid looking at her.

"Kid?" she gasped, suddenly fully awake.

He smiled.

"Hey. You ain't a lieutenant anymore. You looked good in that uniform. I liked it," he whispered tiredly.

She smiled back and knelt beside him on the bed, touching his forehead. The fever was gone.

"Nope. I´m back to being a girl, honey," she said, brushing a few strands of hair away from his face.

"You've always been a girl," he murmured, remembering what she had told him the first time they kissed, right after he found out about her secret. "I like that, too."

"Well, you should have seen our Captain´s face when I told him," Lou replied. "He didn't like it. At all."

Kid chuckled softly. But then his face suddenly darkened, as if he had just remembered something, and he quickly tried to sit up. Even as Lou tried to stop him he got dizzy and slumped back on the pillow.

"Hey, take it easy!" Lou claimed. "You weren't with us for almost three weeks, honey!"

He looked frantically at her, with dread deep in his eyes, and grabbed her wrist. He was breathing heavily.

"My leg?" he asked, almost inaudibly.

Lou smiled reassuringly at him and stroked his hair with her free hand.

"It´s still there, honey."

He looked at her doubtfully, almost panting.

"Here, take a look for yourself, if you don´t believe me," Lou said, putting her arm behind his head and shoulders to help him slowly sit up. "We don´t want you to faint out of worry, now, do we?"

Kid stared at the sheets for a moment and then he quickly pulled them aside. Lou heard him sigh in relief. He had a huge, nasty scar from his knee to his upper thigh, by far the biggest one of his collection, Lou thought. But it was almost healed.

He stared at his leg for a moment and then turned to look at her. There was so much relief in his eyes that Lou felt a sudden urge to wrap him in her arms and never let go. But she just smiled at him.

"I, I don´t…" Kid stammered. He took a deep breath and then let the air out. "Thank you."

His eyes were shimmering with tears. Lou stroked his shoulder and cupped his cheek with her other hand.

"I promised, Kid, remember?" she said, looking straight into his eyes. "You kept _your_ promise. What made you think I wouldn´t keep mine?"

Kid chuckled as a single tear rolled down his cheek.

"I know, baby, I know."

"Well, now I guess you owe me one," she said playfully.

"Lou," Kid replied, smiling broadly now, " I've owed you more, and in so many ways, than I´ll be ever able to count for a long time now. But, thank you, for this."

Lou got serious for a moment. She didn't want to ruin Kid happiness but she needed to make sure he knew where they were standing.

"Kid, you know that was a bad wound, don't you? It'll take some time for you to fully recover, and the doctor says you'll have a permanent-"

Kid took the hand she still had on his cheek and squeezed it to interrupt her. He nodded. "It's alright, honey, I know. It doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter. We can make that work."

Lou smiled at him again. Sometimes she was amazed by how much she loved this man.

"Well, you don´t have to worry, then. I´ll have you walking and riding in no time! And that´s a promise, too."

Kid chuckled again and shook his head. "I´m sure you will, Lou."

He lay back on the bed, taking her with him. Lou put her head on his chest, and curled up against him, feeling his warmth, his heartbeat, his breathing, his smell. She had known for a long time now that she just couldn´t live without him.

"So," Kid said softly after a while, stroking her back, "when are we going home?"

"We need you to gain some strength first, honey," Lou replied. "And we definitely need to feed you. Look at you, you're just skin and bones. What would Rachel say if I brought you home like this?"

Kid laughed and held her tight. And there, in his arms, Lou felt as if she were home already.

THE END

**Thank you, Pilarcita, for taking your time to help me making this story so much better. I couldn't do this without you.**

**And thank you to the wonderful ladies on the Plus. Meeting you made me want to write again.**


End file.
